Northwestern's Deal with Trump

13 January 2026

The deal reached between Northwestern and the federal government under the Trump administration is encouraging in that it restores vital research funds. These funds are crucial for the job security of many workers on campus: postdocs, graduate students, and staff alike.

But at what cost, long term? Is this a mutually beneficial deal, or blackmail and extortion? How temporary is this relief? Where does it end? 

The full text of the deal can be found here. Northwestern, in its glowing portrayal of the deal in recent communications, has downplayed or neglected to mention critical faults with the deal, which will hurt all of us. There are significant concessions in the deal that will disproportionately affect the already disadvantaged and marginalized in our community. Northwestern decided to announce the deal on the Friday after Thanksgiving, when nobody was checking their emails. Read our full analysis here. 

The Deal 

Over the Thanksgiving break, Northwestern’s administration announced the signing of a deal with the federal government under the Trump administration to restore $790 million in federal research funds to Northwestern. Signing this deal will close several pending or ongoing investigations and compliance reviews from federal entities, including the Department of Education, the Department of Justice, and the Department of Health and Human Services. This deal also ends any stop-work orders on non-terminated grants and contracts: contracts that were not terminated but for which the U.S. government ordered researchers to cease work. 

In return, Northwestern must modify its admissions and hiring practices to completely remove any consideration of diversity in the pool of applicants. Northwestern will also continue to evaluate and report to the federal government on campus safety for Jewish students. Northwestern must also adopt and promote views and implement policies that do not recognize a difference between sex and gender. These policies include changing the medical services that Northwestern offers its community and to the broader public in Evanston and Chicago. Northwestern must terminate the 2024 Deering Meadow agreement with student demonstrators. Terminating this agreement requires Northwestern to cease construction of a space for Middle Eastern and North African (MENA) and Muslim students. Finally, Northwestern will pay $75 million directly to the federal government over three years, approximately 10% of the $790 million in frozen funds. 

To ensure compliance with the deal, Northwestern must provide detailed reporting to the federal government (and especially to the U.S. Assistant Attorney General for the Civil Rights Division of the Department of Justice) every academic quarter, under which Northwestern’s President or Interim President and Chair of the Board of Trustees must each independently attest under penalty of perjury that Northwestern is in full compliance with all provisions in the deal. 

The U.S. government is not prohibited from conducting further compliance reviews or investigations into any of the conduct of the University. 

Important concessions and problems with this deal 

Reducing diversity at the University 

It is important to note that our community is, factually, very diverse. This is a strength. As cited on Northwestern’s own webpage on diversity—for now, at least, before the page is taken down—students graduating in 2028 originate from 75 different home countries. The University’s own postdoc demographics indicate that 73% of postdocs at Northwestern are international workers. 

This matters when the Trump administration has been transparent in its loathing of diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) and its goal of changing the demographic makeup of the country through violent mass deportation. This is the lens through which we must understand their demands in this deal. The goal of the Trump administration is to reduce diversity, plain and simple. Accepting this deal will lead to sweeping changes: 

(...) Northwestern has removed any requirements for a diverse slate of candidates for employment based on protected characteristics. 

Postdocs and research associates, present and future, will be impacted by this deal. What will that 73% look like in a few years, under this deal? 

We know for a fact that DEI-minded initiatives and practices at all stages, including hiring, boost the quality of research. This deal will damage Northwestern’s research output for years to come. Compounding these changes, Northwestern will also “(...) 

examine its business model and determine whether steps are necessary to decrease financial reliance on foreign student admissions or partnerships with foreign entities.” Who determines if Northwestern is doing enough to “examine its business model”? Did you consent to reducing your collaboration or partnerships with researchers at foreign institutions? 

Moreover, despite the obvious contradiction with the federal government’s insistence that diversity not be a factor in hiring, they have demanded that the University report:  “(...) historical anonymized admissions data broken down by race, ethnicity, grade point average, and performance on standardized tests” to the federal government. The federal government was already entitled to such data, but we have reasonable fears about how it will use this data in the context of this deal. Will the Trump administration comb through Northwestern’s admissions data to verify that Northwestern is admitting the right people? What might the federal government do with data on ethnicity and test scores? If the federal government doesn’t like the numbers in our reported demographics, will they withhold funding once again? 

For those who do make it through these new admission standards, they will soon learn that Northwestern has conceded to “training” international students: 

“(...) Northwestern will also develop training materials to socialize international students to the norms of a campus dedicated to free inquiry and open debate”. 

Why do international students need socialization training? What specific norms do we need to follow? This deal does not exemplify free inquiry, nor open debate. Will internationals be socialized in the importance of not criticizing conservative political commentators, and reporting and firing those who do? These concessions mean that international students and workers who already have a target on their back will be further discouraged from using their right to free speech. 

Attempting to erase nonbinary and transgender people 

There is a scientific consensus that there are more than two genders and gender is a social construct: see the learning objectives of Northwestern’s Gender and Sexuality Studies program. And yet, Northwestern has signed a deal that requires it to accept the Trump administration’s backwards and unscientific understanding of gender, actively harming nonbinary and transgender workers and students on our campus. The University cannot claim to care for its transgender workers and students while co-signing a deal that denies their existence and humanity. 

Going beyond campus, Northwestern will be prohibited from providing gender-affirming care for individuals under 18 years old at its medical facilities. This aspect of the deal impacts not just Northwesterners but the broader Chicago, Evanston, and Illinois communities. Were those communities consulted? Never forget that this is about life and death: Gender-affirming care is life-saving care for the youth who need it. 

In making these concessions, Northwestern has taken on an active role in the attempt to further marginalize or completely erase gender minorities. Were any nonbinary or transgender workers or students consulted during the negotiation of this deal? 

Attacks on academic freedom and fundamental rights 

In light of important efforts towards combating antisemitism, Northwestern has conceded to restrict our right to protest. Our right to protest is inextricably linked to our academic freedom. Yet, Northwestern has agreed to enforce a “[p]rohibition on demonstrations and other protest activities that occur in academic buildings and places where academic activities take place and that impede ordinary classroom activities or studying (...)”. 

The safety of Jewish students is important, period. But under the guise of keeping students and workers safe, the Trump administration is making all of us less safe and violating our fundamental rights. The U.S. Constitution protects the right to protest through the First Amendment, which guarantees freedom of speech, assembly, and the right to petition the government. There is a reason this is the first amendment. An organizer from Jewish Voice for Peace’s Northwestern chapter stated: 

They’re using Jews in order to do a project that they have always wanted to do. That has nothing to do with keeping Jews safe and everything to do with advancing a far-right antidemocratic project. 

The federal government under Trump wants to silence and criminalize not only any criticism of a foreign nation, but also any criticism of their own administration. Northwestern, in conceding to the Trump administration, is playing an active role in the far-right antidemocratic project to erase the fundamental rights of anyone on American soil. 

The deal also empowers University security and personnel to force students to remove their masks if they believe the masks are being used to conceal identity. But who determines whether a mask is to conceal identity or prevent the spread of a cold? What about those who choose to wear masks in public, for their safety and the safety of others? Many of us work in hospitals where a mask is either the norm or explicitly required—what about them? 

Will masked ICE agents swarming Chicago be asked to remove their masks when they enter campus? 

Finally, Northwestern has also conceded to terminate the Deering Meadow agreement, reached between student demonstrators and Northwestern in 2024. Among the terms of this agreement is the building of “an immediate temporary space for Middle Eastern and North African / Muslim students”, a demand of students long before the 2024 demonstrations. Already, the frequently-used temporary space which had been established in Norris is gone, plans to construct a more long-term space by 2026 have been cancelled, and the University has unpublished the webpage detailing the Deering Meadow agreement. The termination of this agreement is a government-imposed punishment towards students who exercised their right to protest and free speech, whether they be Christian, Jewish, Muslim, or of any religion, including no religion. 

The unilateral termination of the agreement by Northwestern is a reminder of the importance of entering into legally binding contracts, like the agreement your union will soon negotiate with the University. 

A lack of legal clarity 

This deal may not only be amoral, confusing, and vague, but it may also be illegal. Despite the Trump administration’s attempts at consolidating power in the executive, we do still live in a country with a constitution that protects anyone on American soil, regardless of citizenship or how they entered the country. We also live in the state of Illinois, in the cities of Evanston and Chicago, which have laws of their own. Is this deal compliant with the Civil Rights Act? Is it compliant with the Illinois Human Rights Act, which prohibits gender-based discrimination? 

These issues, among others, are why lawyers at Northwestern’s Pritzker School of Law, Professors Heidi Kitrosser and Paul Gowder, contend that the agreement violates the First Amendment and antidiscrimination law. 

It’s no wonder the deal also states: 

If any provision of this Agreement is found to be unlawful, only the specific provision in question will be affected, and the other provisions will remain in full force and effect. 

The federal government knows it’s on shaky ground. Did Northwestern use this to win any concessions? 

Does the University speak for us? 

During a recent media appearance, Governor Pritzker had the following to say about Northwestern’s deal: 

Every time a university signs an agreement based upon this extortion, they’re whittling away just a little bit at the democracy that, I think, we’ve all relied upon. 

He’s right. There was nothing democratic about this deal. This deal was signed despite repeated demands not to make any deals with the Trump administration. These demands include those of the Faculty Assembly, which voted 595 for and 4 against on a resolution that “opposes any capitulation on the part of Northwestern University to these or similar demands that undermine constitutional rights, democratic principles, faculty governance, institutional autonomy, and academic freedom”. Northwestern has unambiguously heard and then ignored the will of the community. Instead, the Board of Trustees conceded to being extorted, leaving the rest of us with a morally and legally dubious deal that is already hurting students and workers on campus. 

In his email to the community, Interim President Henry Bienen claimed, “Northwestern runs Northwestern. Period.” This is simply not the case when the will of the overwhelming majority at the University is ignored. The couple of dozen people on the Board of Trustees have instead bound us to a deal that makes it easier for the federal government to make future interventions which erode Northwestern’s ability to run Northwestern. 

What’s more, these important concessions are being made while Northwestern—known for at various times having the most losses in college football history—is hosting the construction of an $850 million football stadium, the most expensive in history. 

This concession was not necessary. Harvard has held strong and refused to make a deal with the administration. Neither Cornell nor Columbia, in their deals with the administration, conceded on adopting regressive and unscientific definitions of gender nor prohibiting gender-affirming care. Brown did not have to pay a fine to the U.S. Treasury; they were instead able to reinvest in their Rhode Island workforce development programs. Cornell was able to reinvest half of their payout into their own agricultural program. Northwestern, instead, is giving a $75M bribe directly to the administration. There were paths forward for Northwestern other than accepting a comparatively bad deal. 

This is where your union comes in. Alone, we can do very little. But as a body of workers, we have real power. We have our labor, without which Northwestern cannot function, in our hands. And we have an opportunity to use that power in our upcoming negotiations with the University.